Russell, KS \u2013 This is a town of straight lines. The roads don\u2019t bend. Why would they? <\/p>\n
The dark green awning of the A & W is perfectly parallel to the main drag. The root beer stand has a flat roof like Russell\u2019s other squat, one-story buildings, including the Klema Apple Market. It\u2019s a big grocery store that looks like any other, circa 1985. <\/p>\n
The signs naming the contents of each aisle appear hand-lettered. For some reason, there\u2019s a lot of pink food: cookies, eggs, marshmallows, sausages. More so than in other stores I\u2019ve been through. <\/p>\n
The only curvy thing I see is the water tower, with \u201cRussell\u201d in faded, cursive script facing the highway.<\/p>\n
This is rural western Kansas and there appear few analogs to the rural North Country. Except the people. In their work clothes, they\u2019d look right at home from Adams to Ticonderoga. <\/p>\n
After strolling Klema\u2019s aisles, I\u2019m sitting now in Meridy\u2019s restaurant. In the hour I\u2019ve spent in this town, I\u2019ve seen two people under the age of 30, maybe. Most are over 60. <\/p>\n
One other thing I\u2019ve noticed during my travels of late (not just this trip): From New York\u2019s Fifth Avenue to San Francisco\u2019s Fillmore Street, from the Drives of Rodeo in L.A. to Lake Shore in Chicago, hair is dark, defiantly yellow or platinum white or simply shaved off. Gray hair is increasingly a marker of rural America.<\/p>\n
There is a couple in their early 80s, I think, sitting at the table next to mine. He\u2019s a talker, but their conversation (if you could call it that) is stilted, without rhythm. In a disappointed, authoritarian tone, the man tells the woman she needs to put new batteries in her hearing aid.<\/p>\n
Still, he tries to gossip with her about a diner sitting on my other side. This other diner and I hear exactly what he\u2019s saying, all three times he says it.<\/p>\n
Eventually, he gives up.<\/p>\n
Another gray-haired woman finishes her meal and walks over to the couple\u2019s table. They talk about land. The woman standing at the table says she may lose some of her property. The man clicks his tongue and shakes his head. His seated companion asks the standing woman about a recipe for pot roast.<\/p>\n
The singer-songwriter Suzanne Vega has a tune called Straight Lines, about a woman imprisoned by asceticism and solitude. It\u2019s running through my head right now. \u201c\u2026behind straight lines, stra-a-a-aight li-i-i-ines.\u201d<\/p>\n
The waitress asks me if I\u2019d like anything else. I\u2019m stuffed. The check for my massive veggie omelet with hash browns, toast and a pot of coffee: $5.50.<\/p>\n
I leave a five on the table and pay the cashier with the other crumpled bills in my front pocket. \u201cCome visit us again soon!\u201d<\/p>\n
As I walk out of Meridy\u2019s, I see another curvy thing: a late-model Dodge pickup truck. It\u2019s remarkable for two reasons: it is bigger than any other pickup I\u2019ve seen. It\u2019s bigger than the typical 30\u2019 x 20\u2019 house in the North Country. And, instead of a front license plate, it has a small sign (that\u2019s about the size of the hood on my car) that says, \u201cEAT BEEF.\u201d<\/p>\n
Accelerating from the on-ramp as I get back on I-70 West, there\u2019s another faded sign: \u201cBeef. It\u2019s What\u2019s for Dinner.\u201d That\u2019s the hope here, anyway. That America eats beef and the people at Meridy\u2019s can hang on to their graze land for another year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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